N2b spent on rebasing of economy

The Federal Government is said to have spent N2billion for the rebasing of the economy last year.

Mr. Moses Tule, the Director Monetary Policy of the CBN, made this disclosure at the 20th Seminar for Finance Correspondents and Business Editors in Calabar, Cross River State.

This amount, he said, is different from what the federal government and other agencies contributed to the exercise.

In spite of these contributions, Tule noted that Nigeria’s economy is living on the illusion of being strong as some sectors considered informal were not captured in the rebasing exercise yet the country brags of being the largest economy in Africa.

Tule cautioned that “if we do not control our consumption pattern, we will not have a Naira, because you cannot plan on the volatility of the price of crude oil alone. We need change our structure of production to avoid a further forex crisis, and we need to be very careful how we share money from Excess Crude Account (ECA).”

The CBN director also expressed concern that as the country approaches the end of 2015, there has not been any implementation of capital projects across the country noting that “when a government does not execute capital projects there is no future for the country. Execution of capital projects like hospitals, roads and bridges help to reflect the economy with the jobs they create and the opportunities they provide.”

Also speaking on the issue of funding statistical exercises, the former director of research of the CBN Mr. Charles Mordi lamented that “government does not spend enough money on statistical information, and has not investing enough in gathering or generating statistical information, which has lead to poor record keeping.”

He said Nigeria’s external reserve and foreign exchange rate crisis is tied to both resource and management problems as “resources are dwindling and management of these is not improving.”